In the everyday adventures of the big city unemployed, I come into contact with a bevy of different professionals doing their "professional" work, refusing to be pigeonholed into the normalcy of the working world. I popped in on a medical clinic, where girls in slinky socks and clogs mingled with secretaries wearing highnecked sweaters and gstrings, who were either acupuncturists, herbal doctors, massage technicians, or possibly even plain janes who fell into a job on the temp service site of craigslist. I stopped in to a tall building downtown, across from Powell's universe of books where I go weekly to volunteer to file random things in an ancient cabinet and there were three women and a tall smile laced man who greeted me warmly. They were curious people, asking about my day and how I was. I dropped off a CycleDeli menu in the hopes that they would order next week, but these are writers working for a nonprofit who hoard their money for books, new releases, a bottle of nice wine, and maybe a new pair of Dansco clogs for the upcoming anthology release party. Then I crossed Burnside and down into Oldtown, where my friend Sam (not the woman who lets me live with her) works in an old building with lots of windows and a habittrail of hallways and stairwells. He is a internet guru, a web designer who surfs the web like Laird Hamilton surfs pipeline. He showed me the set up, showed me the conference rooms with handmade (from recycled doors!) tables, the huge windows, the dominating Vaio video monitors on the wall and all of the young, hip, urban, funky folk who live and work there. A coworker was shovelling some food into his mouth from a styrofoam togo box, while an uneaten slice of pizza the size of a dinner plate sat untouched in front of his buddy to the left.
The point is that all of these people that I came into contact with are living the life of a professional, whether they want to be called that or not. I have never considered myself a professional, and only just recently became aware of the fact that I have/had a career. What seems funny to me is that in my former life of an Alaskan, there were very few "professionals" in my immediate world, most of whom would be reluctant to call themselves that for fear of being labeled an "adult". Most of my friends and associates were what I would call "workers", able to do most any job capably and some jobs quite proficiently. We weren't professionals at all, just people trying to get by and make some money so that we could hang out together, and bitch about working. PeterPan syndrome, I believe is what some call this infatuation with staying young and refusing to grow up, but the ability and desire to try new things, to avoid the rut of putting in years of servitude is what keeps us young not the refusal to grow up because I like my graying hair and expanding belly. I am a cook, that's what I am, but because I refuse to scale the ladder of success in that field, I find the word professional offensive.
The move down into this professional world has always felt at odds with who I am. When I was cooking here, I felt like I had to prove my worth in the cooking community and act the part of a respected professional in my class. Well, that's just not who I am and maybe that was why that experiment didn't last very long. I'm still a kid trying to get used to the idea that I have a career and a house and a fiance and a dog and a car and a stock portfolio. I also have a 31 year old woman living with me who insists that I stay young forever because she doesnt want an old man cramping her style.

The sun comes out along Tom McCall waterfront park in February and you would think the asylum had just opened its doors and released the patients. Airplanes buzzed overhead in continuous circles, spying on the traffic, the river, and the pulse of humanity wandering down the promenade. The kids at the USS Oregon war memorial packed their loaded apple and celebrated 4:20 a few hours early. An old black guy with a grizzled beard and milky eyes talked to his burrito while cannibalizing it at the same time. All the black clad youth stood in stark contrast to the blue sky and ghostly pallor of their exposed skin. Vampires exposed, warmth and summer on the way, slinking back into their five month coffins. Grass slithery with perceived wetness and the first traces of brave joggers without gloves and hats. Bike path brisk with noontime walkers, strollers, bikers, strutters and the pillars of any waterfront public space, the homeless.
I felt especially good today, having done my volunteer shift at Oregon Public Broadcasting (yep, im answering phones for their pledge drive:)!), made my first batch of lunches for my new business empire, the cycle deli, and then did more volunteer work filing papers and reading essays for my group Write Around Portland. A busy day. And now, as my gin sits sweating on a coaster, im thinking about going to the blazer game with samantha. We have yet to go to a game, and mr durant and his Thunder are in town, so it should be a nice pasting by the visitors.
I do have to say, that things are looking up...we have irises blooming in the front, along with crocus', and inside is a burgeoning hyacynth as well as a chia pet.
Our new fish Masta (who is a beta) is living comfortably in his cracked glass bowl while a stalk of bamboo springs out of his house, swimming his circles and eating blood worms to satisfy his sushi craving.

Today just may be the first day of the rest of my life. last night while sitting on the couch contemplating my inherent idleness, sam and I came up with 'the next BIG thing'. It is an idea borne out of simplicity, necessity, and mr zappa's mother's of invention, an idea that transcends restaurants and food carts, drive thru fast food and sack lunches. It takes elements from all aspects of food service and wraps it into one tidy little package called...MATTY'S CYCLE DELI...hows that for a catchy name?
The more we started to think about it the bigger it got, and the better it became, and the more money we were making, and before you knew it, we were vacationing half the year in Mexico with our own private palapa and getting hitched on the beach with all of our friends enjoying rounds of tequila and beer on us. It went that fast. But truth be told, reality is a nice brisk headwind when starting a new business, and this one will be no different.
My goal is to provide a healthy, quality alternative to those people in the workplace with not enough time to go out and grab something, as well as those folks who have exhausted the lunch choices within walking distance of their places of employment. I want to make sandwiches that buck the 'subway' norm, push people out of their comfort zone by not giving them a choice, but rather forcing themselves to trust me in my creativity. Their only choice will be vegetarian or meat. I'll do the rest of the work for them. Check either box on the order sheet and your sandwich will be delivered the next day. Of course, this won't be an everyday job, god forbid, but what I'm hoping for is to develop enough of a client base where I make three deliveries to three different locales three days a week of between 10-20 sandwiches per delivery. I'm thinking 45 sandwiches a day, three days a week at twelve bucks a pop...what is that? nearly five bills a week, and doing deliveries on my bike with a rack (a very large one apparently)and a smile.
I love making sandwiches, it just might be my favorite food, and the scope of variety is endless so not only will I not get bored, but neither will my customers. I've been sitting around far too long this winter trying to figure out what to do with my time, and I think I may have hit the nail on the head with this one. It's a simple idea made

January 30, 2010
One of the joys you forget about when you live in Alaska is that of the ‘road trip’. Living in just about any other state (except Hawaii), roads are endless, spreading out in the four directions, and beckoning the wandering spirit in all of us.
If you drive a full day from Seward you might make it out of the state. A full day’s drive from Portland lands you in San Francisco. In Missoula, Montana. In Reno. And even deep into Canada if you wish. I love road trips. Love seeing the highway out in front of me, the cooler packed within arms reach, the dog resting plaintively between the seats watching, and a Sam with mismatched socks splayed on the dashboard. We pack the gear in the rocketbox on the roof next to the bikes, leaving Abby’s bed, a tote of “campstuff”, our clothes and some food inside the Subaru and off we go. And then we drive.
We did a fair bit of exploring this summer and fall but we recently drove down I-5 to California for Christmas with my family, and then I did it again solo about two weeks later to help my mom celebrate her 65th birthday. Now, road trips with family and friends and lovers are great as it’s all about the destination, not so much the journey itself, whereas the solo car ride is a more introspective endeavor filled with old songs played at great volume with bad singing accompaniment, some steering wheel drumming, a bit more flaunting of the local speed limits (hello 95 through Ashland at midnight) and maybe a more generous splash of gin in my tumbler.
Driving the I-5 corridor is a 75mph experiment of staying awake and staying between the white lines, as cops don’t care about egregious violations of speed but they do care if you are swerving at 80. The drive to Sanfran is ten hours in a straight shot, or broken up, into two manageable days by yourself. I left Portland at five in the afternoon (nice rush hour planning), drove til midnight then found a deserted little road disappearing into the Trinity wilderness and slept for eight hours in the comfort of my empty car. I cruised through the Shasta wilderness area in a blizzard, me and drive by truckers keeping pace while Kia and Mazda shuffled along at 35. I flew through he Sacramento River delta bird refuge seeing hawks on posts, geese in V formation a hundred strong, a melting sunset, countless ducks and waterfowl, and even a few deer.
I listened to the football game. I turned back the clock to the Grateful Dead and did the Jerry jam for an hour or two. I listened to cartalk. Twice in the same day (different editions!). I made up stories for the people in the cars next to me. I put my feet up on the dash while setting the cruise control to 72. I ate a chicken club at Carl’s Jr. I got excited when the odometer clicked over to 34,000 miles. I drank baileys and coffee followed by a Guinness (in the same cup).
Basically, I had a good time by myself doing exactly what I wanted to do when I wanted to do it and how I wanted to do it. It was a small bit of pleasure that I had forgotten how much I enjoyed. Sometimes we get too caught up in stereotyping aloneness, equating being alone with being lonely, but a solo road trip is anything but lonely as you have your whole head to explore and talk to.

Stuporbowl
January 30,2010

Having listened to but not watched the last game of the playoffs while driving north from San Francisco, I had made a bet with my buddy George after watching the first quarter of the Viking-Saint game. I bet him that in his desire to be “the Man”, “the Hero”, and to have his gunslinger reputation put to rest permanently, Brett Favre would do something so insanely stupid that everyone from the casual fan to the most hardened critic (including Favre backers), would know that there isn’t room in the NFL anymore for egos as big as his. Not at quarterback anyway. He took my bet and today owes me a nice bottle of scotch.
He gave that game away. Gave it away because he needed to make a play that justified all his stupid plays in years past. He needed to complete that pass or make that first down at whatever the cost (hello, twelve men in the huddle with the game on the line???!!!) to his team. He is the consummate pro, don’t get me wrong, but when the game is on the line, he might not even be in the top ten quarterbacks I would choose to have under center in a big game.
I’m not bashing Favre but I hate what he stands for and what he is playing for now that he is out of Green Bay. He wants another ring to cement his status as the greatest ever. I can’t fault him for that, but holding teams hostage to deal with his inability to decide if he wants to play another season is insane. The Packers made the right call in letting him walk, and today are laughing all the way to the pro bowl as Aaron Rodgers has done a more than capable job of filling Brett’s shoes. What happens if no contending team wants him and only the Raiders, Bucs, and Seachickens want to sign him? Does he sign? HELL NO. Will he sign to be a backup? HELL NO.
Brett is as selfish as it gets, and in that respect he is a lot like a Major League baseball player, going to the highest bidder for their services for one year in the hopes that they have a career year and take that team to the promised land. Well, I can tell you right now, that Favre’s best year was the one he just had. Seven interceptions? Unheard of, and if he doesn’t get hurt the poor coach who has him has to play the guy just because he is a Hall of Famer.
If he was smart and willing to do the right thing, because even he knows he can’t have this kind of year again, he would tell Childress he is retiring as soon as possible so the Vikings can get on with their lives and start digging through the scrap heap of the NFL’s unwanted to find next year’s quarterback. Hey, Michael Vick, need a job?
But, because Favre is who he is, he’ll keep everyone waiting, hoping, watching, so that he can make his big announcement when the timing is right, and when the media need a story. Selfish. I’m truly sorry to all those Viking fans out there (Scotty, you listening? Riley, you too?) who have to put up with this.
And in a related story, Adrian Peterson, the greatest runner in the game today, contacts Lester ‘the molester” Hayes and wonders if he can borrow some stickum for next year.

Eight minutes
In my mother’s kitchen…
Lie the trappings of a single mom with two kids and not nearly enough time to utilize the kitchen as it was meant to be pre-divorce. She took the house while Glenn (dad) moved into a condo downtown with that tramp of a secretary. She used to cook. It used to be clean. She had a marble inlay for pastry, dough and biscuits, a Wolf range and an espresso machine. Now, she drinks instant coffee, the kids crack walnuts on the marble and the oven is a convenient storage place for more stuff she won’t have time to use. We help when we can but we think mom likes the controlled chaos that is her kitchen, spending as little time as possible in it while abusing the microwave for our meals. Our dogs get the floor, a cold hard tile able to break anything but plastic and perfect for licking. They nonchalantly perch just off the room waiting for the inevitable, knowing it’s only a matter of time before something falls, splashes or spills. Smart dogs.

Twelve minutes
The sound of the gate…
Echoed behind me as I left the garden. Its hinges barely hinged so it generally slapped easily against the chain link. It was a garden of rocks and weeds and junk and statues and driftwood, scrap metal and the random plastic animal living out the rest of its life peacefully in idle bliss. It had no order to it, no real life but served as a depository for his life, and the squeaky clang of the closing gate served as a timeless reminder that this area of his world was contained. Neatly within its boundaries, the gate kept most things from escaping and spreading down the sidewalk and into the street to overtake passersby and stalled cars. Because his garden was not growing anything, friends wondered why he called it that, but to him a garden was a metaphor for a peaceful place to just exist. There was a rickety metal chair he sat in under the seedless birdfeeder to smoke cigarettes (which he dumped in ever increasing abundance in Folgers cans littered around his chair) and think about empty spaces and the problem of hunger. His garden provided a respite from the dreariness of normalcy and as the gate sometimes swung open, that world, outside normal world would infiltrate his space and irritate him. His statues would sometimes appease him, all stoic and unflinching in even the direst of circumstances, but even they are starting to show the cracks of time and he wondered if anything was truly sacred.


Ten minutes
Things I’ll miss…
No matter how hard I try to anticipate the 90 mph fastball coming out of the mechanical pitching machine, I still can’t hit it. I see the ball fine as it goes down the ramp, into the clear chute, and onto the wheel and then WHAM---it’s by me and hitting the backstop. I foul off a few of them of course, but my appreciation for major leaguers (pitchers and hitters) has risen off the charts. Until you stand in against a known entity (the pitching machine) in a controlled environment (the batting cage) where you know when, where, and what kind of pitch is coming, and STILL can’t hit it, you have no idea how much talent it takes to be in the bigs. Imagine facing Tim Wakefield for six innings (knuckleballer), then flame throwing Carlos Zumaya of the Tigers who tops out at 101 mph, then CC Sabathia’s 88mph change up that snaps your wrists in two as you try to hold up. Then in the ninth, just try to put some wood on Mariano’s split fingered nastiness. Funny thing is, you might even get two of these guys in the same at bat! I’ll swing and miss at anything tossed to me if it’s thrown at a major league park, and I can stand in wearing spikes and an old school jersey.

Six minutes
The street that I live on
Is at the top of a long steep hill, surrounded by redwoods and madrones, we live in a cul de sac with two other neighbor families, six dogs, a fig tree, some cats, blackberry and raspberry rows, my two brothers and another family of five and one of four. Yes, it’s a busy cul de sac especially when my parents entertain. They like to throw parties at the house on top of the hill, mom will make endless hors d’oevres while constantly sipping her stoli martini while dad stands on the deck, meaty hand wrapped around a rocks glass full of gin, telling stories and poking the coals of the BBQ. Sometimes cars would be lined out the driveway forcing people exit in reverse order in which they came, leaving hangers on like mr. McGill fumbling for his keys, three sheets to the wind but driving home in the days before MADD was a presence.

Three minutes
On the day I was born
It was raining cats and dogs. The electricity had gone out on Oak Knoll, the wind was screaming and branches were strewn across our empty road. Of course my dad was in an airplane flying from Palm Springs to San Francisco. Of course he quit sucking on his unfiltered camels today. Of course the little Cessna he was flying caught on fire. Of course Fresno would have to do. Of course there were no rental cars but a long distance trucker making his last stop before heading north. Of course my dad made it.

Fifteen minutes
Everyone knew him as
A tinkerer, a fiddler, a noodler, someone unable to keep his hands, feet or mind still. It’s chaotic controlled energy that possesses him and it’s the closest thing to electricity I have ever seen. Even asleep, which is only rumored, his eyelids flutter, his muscles twitch, and nonsense drifts from his mouth in incomplete sentences. He has a dog that is unlike him in every way, a big lazy st. Bernard named Benson that gets tired just watching the man. Some days are spent in the garage among the dozen or so half finished projects…the lawnmower/pruner hybrid, the three wheeled bike with built in GPS, the table with six legs. Its all part of the plan, he says. The garage is his sanctuary, the place to come and drink Pabst from the self made kegerator and smoke Marlboros while letting the wonder of his mind loose on the future. Picking up a wrench, dragging on his cig, and knocking out a beat on an empty 55 gallon barrel, the sound echoes around the shop without direction. He stops and goes to the table saw, looks at it disapprovingly and moves on. This is how the day goes, moving from one thing to another with no purpose and a complete lack of intensity. He picks up a guitar nestled in the middle of a stack of tires, plugs in the amp at his feet and rips off a few Jimmy Page power chords, feeling the sound reverberate through his body. Benson watches impassively. The cigarette gets snubbed out in a BigGulp, hissing violently before becoming history.

Seven minutes
At the red light
She shook with almost uncontrollable fury. Tears fought each other to be the first down her cheeks but the swipe of an angry hand erased any notion that he would get the satisfaction of seeing her cry. It was an ugly two minute fight, a Mike Tyson affair with a left cross followed by the right hook. He was sleeping with her and she caught them in her bed, with her sheets, and her pillows. He was on top of her when he said “ wait babe I can explain.” She had finally let herself go, let herself fall in love with him only to be trampled on once again. She thought about moving to Baghdad where the only thing that could hurt her was sniper fire and bombs.